


wander must

by spqr



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Angst, BAMF Stiles, Established Relationship, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Magical Stiles Stilinski, Misunderstandings, Sort Of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-16
Updated: 2018-01-16
Packaged: 2019-03-05 14:07:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,401
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13389405
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spqr/pseuds/spqr
Summary: Stiles unpins one of the postcards. Accra, Ghana. One corner is torn, but that's not too bad—African mail systems are unreliable at best, nonexistent at worst. Stiles flips it over. On the back, there’s the same thing he wrote on all of them: Be home soon ♡ Stiles.“We need to have a serious conversation about the definition of ‘soon,’” Derek says behind him.[or: a story about leaving]





	wander must

Stiles has never really thought of soot as a liquid before. But it is—a thick, fluid grime that’s gotten under his fingernails and in the seams of his clothes.  He’s still shaking, and the rain’s still pounding against the window in the animal clinic, but it’s not soothing anymore. It’s like a monster knocking, over and over and over, a thousand voices screaming to be let in.

 

“Stiles,” Deaton says. Stiles jumps, eyes snapping to him. Deaton’s not looking at him like he’s a scared kid anymore—he’s looking at him like…like Stiles is someone who should’ve grown up a while ago. “I said, _it’s long past time._ You can’t wait anymore.”

 

Stiles thinks of the quarter-mile crater he left in the forest this morning, and knows Deaton’s right. But, the thing is: he still feels like a scared kid. He still _is_ a scared kid. “I don’t,” he says, but has to pause to swallow down a nervous laugh or a sob or something. “I don’t know where to go. I don’t know what to do, or who to look for for help—“

 

Deaton digs something out of his desk and holds it out to him. It’s a legal pad, a small one that will fit in Stiles’ hoodie pocket, and it’s got a list of names and places and tips, all carefully transcribed in Deaton’s chicken scratch. Stiles flips through it, fingers shaking, leaving sooty fingerprints on the pages.

 

“You’ll still have to figure out most of it on your own,” Deaton says, arms crossed, looking down at him.  “After all, I’m not a mage. There’s only so much I’ve picked up from hearing things. But I think that’s sort of the point.”

 

Stiles nods numbly. His skin feels hot and itchy, which is weird because he’s soaking wet and it’s thirty degrees outside, but he _did_ just explode in the middle of the preserve, so he supposes some heat and discomfort is par for the course. “Thanks,” he says, “for…”

 

“Yeah,” Deaton claps him on the shoulder, and squeezes. “Look, Stiles. I know this is hard. And it’s only going to get harder, but…you can’t linger. Your energy stores are empty now, but you should be _well_ clear of civilization by the time you re-charge, which will be forty-eight hours, at most.” Stiles nods. “I’d start with Mongolia.” Stiles nods.

 

“Stiles.” Stiles nods. “Get going.”

 

Stiles nods, stands from the chair he’s just gotten all sooty. His socks smoosh wetly in his sneakers, which doesn’t make sense at all—none of this makes sense, scientifically, there shouldn’t enough energy in his body to level a whole quarter-mile of trees, it’s _insane_. Whatever, he tells himself. Whatever, just roll with it. Your whole fucking life’s been insane ever since _everything_.

 

He gives Deaton a jaunty salute. The druid inclines his head, and Stiles squelches out.

 

W

 

He doesn’t disappear without a trace. He disappears without _much_ of a trace, that’s true, but it’s not his fault.

 

When he gets home, rain pounding on the Jeep’s windscreen, there’s no patrol car in the driveway, even though his dad’s supposed to be off-shift. He’s probably been called in for the small thermonuclear detonation in the woods. The half of the house that’s still habitable is quiet and empty, and Stiles packs a bag without waiting for his brain to come on line. He has a feeling his brain won’t come online for quite some time, and he has a feeling he forgot to pack socks, but.

 

His cell phone got a little fried in the blowout. He finds his contact list on his laptop and goes to the kitchen for the landline. He tries calling Scott, but there’s no answer. It’s the same with Lydia, and Isaac, and Kira, and Allison, and Cora. Lydia must have had more luck in the library than Stiles was having in the forest, which means the monster of the week issue is coming to a head. _God_ , what a shitty time for him to have a magical crisis.

 

At the last second, he remembers to stuff his passport in his bag, next to the wad of cash he took out of the cookie jar. He’ll feel bad about stealing from his dad later.

 

The rain has stopped and the sheriff’s station is in crisis mode when he idles up, cruisers speeding in and out. Stiles rolls down the Jeep’s window, and waves out the door to Deputy Parrish. It’s a sign of how much shit must be going down right now that Parrish doesn’t even bat an eye at the Sheriff’s son, covered in soot. “Hey,” Stiles says, “where’s my dad?”

 

“Out at the preserve,” Parrish says, barely stopping. “I can drive you out—“

 

“No,” Stiles says quickly. He doesn’t have time to get caught up in all this, no matter how much his heart is telling him to. “No, I’ll…see him later. Thanks.” Parrish runs off. “Good luck!” Stiles shouts. Parrish waves.

 

It’s raining again by the time he pulls up to Derek’s building, a sad, lackluster drizzle. Stiles pulls the key out of his shirt as he takes the stairs two at a time up to the loft. He already knows there’s zero chance of the alpha being home, what with the rest of his pack out on the hunt, but he’s still holding out hope, right until the last moment, when he pushes the door open. Their pack den is deserted, a dozen space heaters turned off.

 

Stiles takes a second to wish he had his phone, so he could send a text blast. _Gotta go, sorry, NOT kidnapped. Really_. But Derek doesn’t have a phone anyways, and Derek might be even more important than Scott these days. Stiles digs pen and paper out of Derek’s kitchen drawer, scribbles a quick note, pauses, adds another line at the bottom, and sticks it to the fridge.

 

It’s not much of a trace. But by the time the pack finds it and starts panicking, he’ll be halfway to Mongolia. And werewolves don’t fly well.

 

W

 

The thing about magic that none of the books tell you is that it _sucks ass._

 

Really, Stiles thinks J.K. Rowling and Tolkein could’ve been a lot more honest in that regard. Sure, all that _saving the world_ , _not getting eaten by orcs_ stuff is easier when you can blast apart reasonably-sized mountains with just your mojo, but…

 

In between life-threatening situations, magic is mostly trying not to knock things over by accident. It’s stubbing your toe and feeling a hot little flash of frustration and reading about a factory fire in the local newspaper and wondering if you did that. It’s laying awake at night because your skin is itchy and you’re too afraid to go to sleep in case you _explode_ again.

 

Magic is a houseguest who’s overstayed their welcome and doesn’t give a _flying fuck_. It’s not a part of him, it’s an intruder in his body. But he has to learn to get along with it, because it’s not going anywhere, and he’s not either.

 

W

 

The mages Deaton points him to in Mongolia refuse to take him in until he explodes on their front doorstep.

 

He doesn’t do any damage. They’ve got wards in place that grab all his energy and wrestle it down into a tight little ball that just sort of fizzes angrily until it loses steam and goes out, which makes him think they were _waiting_ for him to explode. Like it proves something.

 

He’s half-frozen. The school is high in a mountain, overlooking the northeast steppes, far from Mongolia’s sparse population, and he’s been sleeping bundled in about four hoodies, hidden from the wind by the protruding stone doorway. Not exactly cozy. He’s been dreaming of the den and Derek’s couch, strong arms and dark hair and intense technicolor eyes and his alpha rumbling in his sleep when Stiles tries to shift away, but—

 

The mages herd him into a warm antechamber, divest him quickly of his bag, divest him of his hoodie, his sneakers, his shirt, and—“What the _fuck_ , guys”—his pants, then herd him again, this time into a weird, rectangular room with holes cut into one wall. The stones are dripping, it’s freezing, Stiles is still feeling hot and itchy and hollow from _exploding_ , and this is shit. This is such shit. Why did Deaton send him to these assholes? Did they just _mug_ him, seriously?

 

There’s an ominous creaking, a pipe sticks out of one of the holes, and freezing water _blasts_ out. Stiles tries to dodge, but he can’t, and fucking _ow. Ow. Cold. Ow._ He yells as much.

 

The water stops, long enough for a loudspeaker in the corner to crackle and one of the mages to demand in English, “ _Release your energy.”_

 

Stiles goggles at it incredulously. “I don’t _have any left!”_ he shouts. The water comes again, pounding him against the back wall. He shakes like a leaf. “ _I’m EMPTY!”_ he screams, when it stops again. “I just _exploded it all out—“_

“ _You are not empty,”_ the loudspeaker contends. “ _You are never empty. Only blind. You must first learn to see the energy,_ feel _the energy, before you can control it. Until then, you will be cold. If you want to be warm, release your energy.”_ The pipe creaks again, signaling oncoming water.

 

“WHAT THE FUCK!” Stiles shouts, panicked. “ _Stop,_ stop, okay, I’ll do whateve mumbo jumbo you want, just be reasonable—“

 

The water blasts out again. Stiles doesn’t think of the den, or Derek, or warm strong arms. He doesn’t really think anything except _ow._

 

W

 

As beginnings go, it’s not great.

 

Stiles spends six hours in the freezing water hell box. He’s half-convinced he dies a couple times, and the mages just revive him with their evil Mongolian magic. But once he gets miserable enough to start playing their games, he finds that shiny shard of energy inside himself, forces it out through his ribs, and _explodes_.

 

After that, they leave him to sleep for a good twenty-four hours. He doesn’t actually remember leaving the hell box, but when he wakes up there’s soft golden sunlight filtering into his small room through a slit window, he’s buried in wool blankets, and Derek’s loft key is pressing an indent into his shoulder. He swings the chain around, rubs the lines it left, and presses his face into the pillow.

 

The first month is all about control. Feeling the energy and using it, in very small, very tedious ways. The mages stress daily exercises, little exhalations of magic to keep it from building up, like it does in people who are untrained. Like it did in Stiles in Beacon Hills. Stiles would be bored out of his mind, except it’s _magic_ , and also he isn’t the only one at the school.

 

There’s an old Slovak man who likes to tell vampire war stories and a couple of Sri Lankan twins that Stiles teaches to play poker. There’s a Spanish girl who’s almost— _almost—_ as smart as Lydia, who disappears one day without a word. They’re not his pack, not anywhere close, but it helps to have people to talk to to pass the time who aren’t stone-faced Mongols.

 

Two months in, Stiles has only had one significant mental breakdown, which he considers very impressive. He can peform small, concentrated spells, in close quarters. Levitate books off shelves and put out candles and light them again, that sort of thing. He’d be essentially useless in combat, but that’s sort of the way it’s always been, so he’s not too concerned about that. The big thing is: he doesn’t explode anymore.

 

He’s sort of forgot about the whole “finding himself” thing Deaton told him about, until the mages pick up the school and _move it_ while he’s sleeping.

 

W

 

Stiles finds a coven of witches in rural France next. He doesn’t speak any French, and they refuse to speak English even though he _knows_ they’re fluent, so he’s forced to do his best with a translation book, which means a few spells that are supposed to grow flowers end up disappearing the laces out of his sneakers.

 

As far as Stiles can figure, this is how it’s supposed to go: he wanders around the world, learning what he can from whoever he can find, and in return, he’ll teach whatever awkward teenagers come wandering his way in the future, however he chooses. In a way, it’s neat, the entire worldwide magical community banding together to raise younglings into capable practitioners, but in another way, it’s fucking inconvenient.

 

Stiles wants a crash course. He wants to learn what he needs to learn, and do it fast, so he can go _home_. But there’s no curriculum, no aptitude tests, and technically he could go home anytime, but he really _can’t_ , not until he knows without a shadow of a doubt that he’s good enough. That he can take whatever comes the pack’s way.

 

So he learns to jive with the magical-community-gardening lifestyle, and picks up French.

 

W

 

If Stiles had expected _anything_ to happen _at all_ , he would’ve expected it to happen this way. They’re both coming down off a high of fear and adrenaline, and…

 

Stiles’ dad is in an ambulance. Stiles’ house is a half-charred mess, still swathed in thick grey-yellow smoke. Stiles is sitting on the hood of his Jeep, wrapped in an orange shock blanket, while firemen come and go up his driveway, while sirens wail in the night and lights swing around, red and blue and blurs at the edges of his vision.

 

It’s been a long, hard night. There’s one moment playing over and over again in his head—the moment when they staggered out onto the lawn, in the cool night air, safe. And the sheriff looked back at the house, flames dancing in his eyes, and said _Claudia_. And he ran back inside, and Stiles yelled _NO,_ and firefighters got there just in time to hold Stiles back, and one of them had to go in to get his dad, and when they came back out, he was clutching a photo album. A photo album.

 

Okay, so it’s more than one moment. More like a terrible, fire-lit series of moments.

 

The Camaro skids up faster than any of the emergency vehicles. Stiles doesn’t look over—he knows what car it is. He hears the door open, and slam closed, and then there are hands all over him, on his arms and his shoulders and his sides, firm and urgent. Like they’re looking for weak spots, wounds. And finally Derek’s hands reach his face, and he turns Stiles to look at him. Stiles’ gaze focuses. Derek’s eyes are very close and _very_ worried.

 

“Sorry,” Stiles says, nonsensically. “I’m fine. Really, all good.”

 

“No you’re not,” Derek says, not taking his eyes or his hands or his entire focus off Stiles’ face. “Come on, we’re going home.”

 

Stiles protests about as much as he’s expected to. Maybe a little more, but you know what they say about _doth protesting too much._ Derek bundles him into the Camaro with forceful hands and drives him across town, casting worried looks at him every few seconds. He asks Stiles once if he wants to go to the hospital to see his father, but Stiles just says _no,_ and Derek doesn’t press it. He knows how Stiles feels about hospitals, and he knows there’s something strange in Stiles’ voice.

 

The loft is empty. Derek goes around flicking on space heaters, and Stiles just stands in the middle of the room, wrapped in his shock blanket, missing his shoes. He didn’t put any on when he left his bedroom. To be fair, the house was on fire.

 

Derek comes over and just stands in front of him. Stiles stares at him. Derek stares back. This isn’t one Stiles can win—Derek’s got a hell of a stare on him, even wound tight as they both are. But it turns out it’s not a competition. Derek says, “You’re not okay.”

 

“I’m fine,” Stiles says.

 

“You’re not.” Derek steps closer. “It’s not about the fire,” he says, voice low. Stiles feels a burst of anger—that Derek knows him so well he can’t even hide _this_. “Stiles,” Derek says. “It’s not about the fire, is it?”

 

He manages a whole ‘nother ten seconds of silence. Then he snaps, flings off the shock blanket, gets it stuck on his arm, and flails it around until it falls away, fluttering to the floor. “No,” he says, “no, it’s not about the _fucking_ fire.”

 

Derek, to his credit, just waits patiently, never moving an inch. Stiles feels the well of all this repressed anger and grief bubbling up inside him, like it’s being pushed by hot molten magma. And now he’s opened his mouth, and it’s all coming out. There’s no stopping it.

 

“It’s dumb,” he says, just to preface the shitstorm. “It’s dumb, okay, and I’m used to being the odd man out in _everything_ , because, you know, I’m human, and that sort of precludes me from a lot of brawls and shit, but—I don’t know, Derek. I don’t know, okay, I get that I’m the most replaceable one here, I get that everyone else has someone who they care about more than they care about me, I get that I’m not coming first in anyone’s book, but…”

 

He scrubs angrily at his eyes and ends up rubbing ash in his eyelashes, which really doesn’t help the whole _crying_ situation, and he can’t look at Derek, he _can’t_. Because of course Derek has to be the one to witness this—the one person who comes first in _Stiles’_ book, when Stiles is pretty sure he’s not even listed until the third page. He exhales hard.

 

“I just, I know it’s selfish,” he continues. “I know love doesn’t work like that, but I thought my _dad_ would at least care about me more than anyone else. But he…he ran inside for _pictures_ of my mom. He doesn’t even care enough to let go of _pictures,_ so he could stay with me. I just—I just…I wish someone loved me enough to hang around, like, for good. That’s all.”

 

There’s a long, long quiet.

 

Stiles feels sick and empty, but he steels himself enough to look up, and—Derek looks _stricken_. The moonlight through the window illuminates his face, and if Stiles didn’t know any better he’d say Derek just watched one of his pack die in front of him. The moment their eyes meet, Derek shocks into motion.

 

He’s across the room in three strides, and then Stiles is being hugged, feet off the floor. He tells himself not to hug back—don’t accept the pity hug—but his hands curl into fists in the sides of Derek’s shirt anyways. He buries his face in Derek’s neck anyways, because _god_ , it feels good. And Derek’s arms feel safe and permanent, and…

 

Derek presses a kiss to his hair. Stiles blinks through hot, ashy tears. Derek’s voice is thick, “You have no idea. You— _Stiles,_ I know I’m shit at this, but you _have_ to know.”

 

Stiles pulls away enough to see Derek’s face, even though that means Derek gets to see the mess that his blotchy, crying cheeks must be. “What?” he says.

 

Derek’s thumbs move under his eyes, tips skimming his lashes. He opens his mouth, but nothing comes out on the first try. Stiles’ lungs catch, and Derek succeeds on the next try, “I’ve never felt as much… _feeling_ for anyone as I do for you.”

 

“You’ve never felt as much _feeling?”_

 

“Oh, shut up,” Derek says, but his voice is very fond and his face is very close. Their noses bump—Stiles’ heart kicks into doubletime, the way it did when he woke up and smelled smoke. “You’re an idiot, Stiles. _God help me,_ I’m so far gone on you—“

 

Stiles kisses him. Derek stills for a moment, like a wave of calm, both of them still wrapped up in each other. Then Stiles makes a soft noise— _not_ a whimper, he _swears_ —and Derek surges into him, desperately.

 

W

 

Derek’s the sort of person who calls sex _making love_. It’s so dweeby, but he blushes up to the tips of his ears the first time Stiles calls him out on it, so he doesn’t say anything after that.

 

They make love in Derek’s bed the night after the fire. Stiles is a virgin, but it doesn’t feel too fast—it feels like _finally, finally_ finding out where he’s supposed to be. Pressed under Derek, nothing else in the world but the sound of their breaths and the reverent drag of Derek’s fingers up Stiles’ side, the way the big alpha wolf hisses softly and drops his face in the pillow when Stiles presses a hand against him through his jeans.

 

The rest of the pack complain about the smell of sex in the den for weeks, but Stiles won’t ever know that. A day later, Deaton will tell him _you’ve got magic in you_ , and Stiles will say _I can’t leave_. _Not right now. Not when I just—_

And two days after that, he’ll be gone.

 

W

 

In the airport in Paris, Stiles walks into one of those dumb touristy stores. He’s just looking for a pack of gum, not any _Paris je t’aime_ merchandise, but something catches his eye.

 

A rack of post cards. They’re all of places he’s never been—this is the closest he’s been to Paris proper since he landed here three months ago. But they give him pause. He thinks of the snow globe Derek keeps on the bookshelf in his bedroom, the one thing that he seems to take with him, always, the one with a tiny New York in it and a note on the bottom in sharpie that says _Love ya, Der Bear ♡ Laura._

 

He buys a post card, scribbles a note, and sends it before he boards his flight to Morocco.

 

W

 

A wizened old shaman in Papua New Guinea teaches him to squeeze drops of history from the roots of ancient trees. _Trees_ , he says, _have seen much more than most men._

A pagan priestess in the heaths of Scotland shows him how to talk rocks into becoming buildings. _A fort’s good protection in a pinch, laddie,_ she says, beaming.

 

A gruff, half-bear skinwalker in Russia picks up a gun and shoots at him. He _hits_ him, because he hasn’t bothered teaching Stiles how to _not_ get shot, yet. The bear-man’s husband tuts a lot and whacks the skinwalker upside the head with a great many wooden spoons and heals Stiles with a potion he calls _foxwater._ When the hole in his hip has closed up, the bear-man teaches Stiles how to re-direct bullets in flight, and then shoots at him some more. But hits him less.

 

A sprite-like mage in a carnival booth in Romania shows him a charm that’s meant to show you your one true love. Your soulmate. She says she uses it to trick lovestruck young girls out of their coins, and Stiles says _trick?_ and she just smiles. Stiles sees Derek for the first time in nearly a year, and of all places, Derek’s sitting in a diner having lunch with the sheriff. As Stiles watches in the silver bowl, he takes the bacon off the sheriff’s plate, chiding.

 

Stiles steps outside into the thick Romanian mud, and his great gasps of air turn to sobs as the flap closes behind him. The noises of the carnival are very far off, and Stiles is very tired and very far from home and magic is cool, sometimes, but _come on. Come on,_ this is too much.

 

The sprite brings him a wand of blue cotton candy. He wipes his nose on his hoodie sleeve, says _thanks_ , and gets the fuck over it.

 

W

 

Magic and Stiles learn to get along.

 

They dance at the beltane fires—the _real_ beltane fires. They go free-diving with pearl farmers in Palau, holding their breath for ages, which is worth the wicked sunburn. They make a crying child on a trans-pacific flight laugh with a small, glittering unicorn that hops over the back of the seat. They save a pack of werewolves from an angry mob in Kashmir.

 

Magic saves Stiles’ life when he falls into a river in Herzegovina. It helps him slip over the Iranian border undetected. It puts a bunch of fruit in his knapsack during that rough patch in Australia. It ties his shoelaces together, that one time, but he forgives it. Mostly.

 

Stiles sits on the edge of table mountain in Cape Town. He wants to call Scott, and say _I’m on a ledge and I need you to talk me down_. He wants to call Derek and say _Come take me home_. But Derek doesn’t have a phone and Scott’s probably too mad at him for leaving, anyway, and he’s so close to the end of this thing he can taste it.

 

His magic gives him a firm nudge—pushes him on his ass, and then scoots him across the rocky mesa. His butt hurts for days, but he gets the message. _Keep going, idiot._

 

W

 

Twenty-one months after he left Beacon Hills, Stiles comes home.

 

His Jeep is still in long-term parking at the San Jose airport, miracle of miracles. Stiles nearly cries when he sees her, this first scrap of home after so many airports and rental cars and trains and buses, but he manages to rein it in. After all, if he can’t keep it together for his _Jeep_ , what hope does he have for the rest of the day? He tricks the automated ticket machine into thinking he’s paid the 9,000 bucks he owes, and cruises out.

 

His dad’s car isn’t in the driveway, so Stiles swallows a lump of anxiety and keeps driving, towards the den. He parks next to the Camaro, and gives himself a few minutes just to breathe and freak out with his forehead against the steering wheel.

 

 _God_ , what if they all hate him? What if they don’t want him to be pack anymore? What if Scott won’t hug him? What if Scott won’t _look_ at him? What if Derek goes back to glares and grunts and punching him in the arm ? What if there are new pack members and he doesn’t even know who they _are?_ What if Derek tries to strangle him like he did that one time—

 

Someone knocks on the window. Stiles jumps about a foot in the air, slams his head against the roof, and whirls around to see: Kira. She yanks his door open. “Stiles, good timing.”

 

“I—” Stiles says. “Thanks?”

 

Kira has blood in her hair and a big, scary looking katana in her hand. She hauls him out of the Jeep. “Come on, you can ride with me. I’ll catch you up on the way there, but here’s the gist of things.” Stiles trails after her to her Prius, brain shorted out. He feels like he has whiplash, but Kira evidently does _not_ have time to baby him. “There’s a coven of huldra trying to take over the forest so they can do some shady shit.”

 

“Huldra?” Stiles asks, folding in to the back seat. Kira’s katana gets the passenger seat, which he can’t really begrudge it. It’s a nice sword.

 

“Yep,” Kira says, pulling out of the parking lot. “Norweigan forest spirits. Like sirens, but in trees. Anyway, they’ve seduced Scott, Isaac, Liam, and Derek, so now me, Allison, Lydia, and Cora have to go rescue their dumb male asses. And since you decided to show up, you’re helping.”

 

“But I’m a dumb male ass,” Stiles says. Kira burns rubber pulling out onto the main road, like they’re in _Fast and Furious: Reasonably Priced Honda_. “Also, who’s Liam?”

 

Kira ignores his second question, and to the first, says, “Do you now, or have you ever had, sexual inclinations towards the fairer sex?”

 

Stiles thinks of that one time Lydia kissed him in the middle of a panic attack, and how squiggy he felt afterwards. How she’d sat him down, and explained in that scholarlier-than-thou way of hers that he’d only ever had a friend-boner for her insane intellect. She’d worded it a lot better, but it made as much sense. Then he thinks of Derek. “No,” he tells Kira.

 

“Good,” says Kira. “Then you’ll be fine.” And she rips the Prius sideways off the road, down a grassy embankment, and into the forest. Stiles holds onto his seatbelt and feels woozy. The gang has, apparently, gotten more badass since he left.

 

They meet the rest of the rescue squad in a clearing, a half mile from the clearing where Kira says the huldra are holding Derek, Scott, Isaac, and whoever the hell Liam is. They don’t have a lot of time for _where the hell have you been,_ but—Allison gives him a teary-eyed smile and a hug, Lydia says, “About time,” and Cora punches him in the face.

 

“Okay,” he says, bent in half and clutching his bloody nose. “Thanks, I deserved that, but can we maybe hold the rest until _after_ we save the day?”

 

Cora crosses her arms and gives him a truly harrowing imitation of her older brother’s glare, but she doesn’t hit him again, so that’s something. Lydia goes to the trunk of her car and comes back with Stiles’ baseball bat, and he could _kiss_ her, squiggy or not. She just fights back a smug smile and says, “I had a feeling.”

 

It’s almost like he never left. They move through the forest silently, and the shadows seem to move all around them, like they always have. Welcome to Beacon Hills, our specialty is creepy times a hundred.

 

Stiles starts to hear high pitched, splintery cackles when they’re a few hundred yards out, over the odd disjointed woodwind music of a huldra sacrifice. They see green fire through the trees. Allison knocks an arrow, Kira grips her sword with both hands, Lydia pulls out her taser, Cora pops the teeth and the fangs, and…Stiles says, “Hold on a second.”

 

They all look at him. It’s terrifying. He holds up his hands. “Just—let me try something.”

 

“They’re about to _sacrifice_ them,” Lydia hisses. But Stiles gives her a look that says _Yeah, I get it_ , and she waves him on. He kneels on the forest floor, leaves crackling under his sneakers, buries his hand in the dirt, and finds roots.

 

 _Hey, mate_ , whispers a tree, far off. The root must be long. Hopefully it goes in the right direction. _Grabby much?_ Stiles sends a question through the root. _Yeah, sure. I see ‘em. Look, we don’t want ‘em here any more than you lot do._ Another question. _Eh. Calls for teamwork. You weird pink squishy things get the six on the near side, I’ll get the other eight._

 

Stiles thanks it and straightens up, brushing off his hand on his jeans. “Okay,” he says to the girls, “there are fourteen of them in the clearing. Luckily, the trees are on our side.”

 

Lydia frowns. “What do you mean, _the trees are on our side?”_ she snaps. _“_ What is this, the Chronicles of Narnia?”

 

“Look,” Stiles says, a little frantic, because the music is picking up and the huldras are cackling their splintery cackles and there are howls now, too. “I know I’ve been gone a long time, and you guys have probably been to hell and back without me. But you went to hell and back _with me_ , once. So please, tell me you still trust me.”

 

There’s a long moment of quiet. Then Allison laughs a little and says, “Of course we do, Stiles,” like it’s the easiest thing in the world. Cora rolls her eyes in agreement.

 

They come out of the clearing like a rain of fury, headed in five different directions. Lydia goes right for the four werewolves tied up in the middle of the fray, Allison, Kira, and Cora each take a huldra, and Stiles _throws_ his baseball bat with a burst of magic behind it. It goes right through one of their chests, and comes out the other side.

 

Lydia unties the boys, but they’re groggy. Drugged, out of it. The other eight huldra are starting to come towards them, festivities disrupted, but before they can get far—a great weeping willow on the other side of the clearing reaches out its branches and seizes them all around the throats. It shakes them, smashes them into other trees, who bristle to help. The huldra go limp, and the tree tosses them aside like trash.

 

Stiles laughs, thrilled. Lydia raises a single eyebrow at him. Even Cora’s giving him a slightly impressed look. It’s hard to read through the _wolfiness_ , but it’s there. Stiles tips an imaginary hat to her, and while he’s busy doing that, Kira shouts, “Stiles, _look out!”_

 

A huldra tackles him. He goes down hard, head inches from a rock. The tree spirit’s sharp fingers grab at his throat, and he tries to kick her off, but she’s _strong_. An arrow flies at her head, but she just bats it away like a fly. Stiles’ vision starts to black .His magic bristles, and before he knows what he’s doing:

 

The rock, which is more of a _boulder_ , tears out of the ground and _slams_ into her. It grinds her into the dirt, and even as Stiles rolls onto his hands and knees, coughing, it keeps hitting her, over and over again, an angry tickle of magic that only turns off when she’s dead.

 

The boulder drops. Cora says, “What the fuck, Stiles,” and he starts laughing, blood from his smashed nose spitting out onto the grass. He _laughs,_ until—

 

Derek’s voice says, “ _Stiles?”_

 

W

 

Night always seems to last forever in Beacon Hills.

 

Deputy Parrish tells Stiles his dad won’t be off-shift until the morning, so Stiles feels beter about not going back to the house. He doesn’t _want_ to be anywhere else but here, anyways, not now that he’s finally back. The pack goes back to their den, curls up to lick their wounds on the ratty worn-in couches—a lot more couches than were here when Stiles left.

 

Scott gives him a big old bear hug, and Stiles cries a little into his shoulder, but Scott’s cool about it. He claps him on the back and says, “Glad you’re home, buddy.” Stiles has never, in nineteen years, loved him any more than he does in that moment.

 

There are more walls here than when Stiles left, too. It feels more like a permanent house, less like a temporary landing pad. Derek’s moved his bed into a private room, but Stiles finds it easily enough, mostly because Derek leaves the door open. He’s waiting inside, sitting on the edge of the bed, head in his hands. Stiles hovers in the door, well aware that Derek knows he’s there, not sure if he’s supposed to come in or not.

 

His eyes travel the room. This is the same bed—he’s sure of it. The headboard is still splintered a little in one spot, where Derek grabbed it too hard trying to get leverage, where he squeezed it to hard when he came, nose tucked under Stiles’ jaw, Stiles’ fingers in his hair. This is the bed they made love in. The furnishings are sparse, but there’s a spot of color on the wall. It’s a cork board, covered in post cards.

 

Stiles walks over. In his peripheral, he sees Derek raise his head, but he doesn’t turn to look. He’s not sure he can handle looking at him full on. He feels pretty emotionally woozy.

 

Instead, he unpins one of the postcards. Accra, Ghana. One corner is torn—African mail systems are unreliable at best, nonexistent at worst. Stiles flips it over. On the back, there’s the same thing he wrote on all of them: _Be home soon ♡ Stiles._

“We need to have a serious conversation about the definition of ‘soon,’” Derek says behind him. Stiles hears him stand up, and pins the card back up.

 

“I can’t believe you kept all these,” he says, turning. But he doesn’t even make it all the way around, because Derek is right up in his space.

 

“Of course I did,” Derek growls, and kisses him.

 

Stiles hangs on for dear life. But then Derek lifts him up and slams him back against the wall, their hips knock together and Stiles hooks his legs around Derek’s backside and hauls him forward, and Derek knocks their foreheads together and says, brokenly, “ _Fuck,_ I missed you.”

 

After that, Stiles gives as good as he gets. Because _fuck,_ he’s missed Derek too.

 

W

 

Derek doesn’t talk to him for eight days after that. In the grand scheme of things, it’s the blink of an eye, but to Stiles it feels like an eternity.

 

The pain of missing Derek across oceans and mountains and countries pales in comparison to the pain of missing him from less than a mile away. Derek’s _right there_ , and for some reason, Stiles suddenly isn’t allowed to touch. He walks funny for a day and a half after their reunion, and then— _nothing._ He feels unfathomably, indescribably _bereft_.

 

“Dude,” Scott says. “Quit using such big words. What the hell. Did you go to dictionary camp or something? Is _that_ where you’ve been?”

 

Stiles crams a handful of bugles in his mouth and goes back to creaming Scott at CS:GO. The luxury of video games has been one he has also been _bereft_ of, but he would give it up in a heartbeat if Derek would just _hold_ him. Re-assimilation hasn’t been as easy as that first night led him to believe—both with the pack and with his dad. He’s had to earn a lot of forgiveness so far, and he’s got a long way to go. He thought he would be able to rest when he got home, but that has _not_ been the case.

 

He’s tired, and confused about Derek, and even worse—his magic is frazzled. It keeps tripping him, and knocking over jugs of milk in the fridge when he’s asleep, and changing channels to _Hallmark_ while his dad tries to watch the Sharks game.

 

“I need to figure my crap out,” Stiles says, forlornly. On-screen, Scott’s terrorist shoots Stiles’ French commando in the face, then knifes a chicken.

 

“Yeah, no shit,” Scott laughs. “I’m _obliterating_ you, dude.”

 

W

 

The one single trace Stiles left on that day twenty-one months ago—the note stuck to Derek’s fridge, the piece of paper the alpha keeps folded in his wallet—goes like this:

 

_Hola amigos,_

_So that crater in the preserve was NOT a meteor, it was me. My bad. Anyway, apparently I’m a ticking magic time bomb just waiting to blow up the whole town, so I have to go on some sort of magic walkabout to find myself so I don’t_ _blow up the town. I don’t know how long it’s gonna be and I’m sorta hazy on the specifics—ask Deaton._

_I s2g I haven’t been kidnapped. Do that wolfy panic-smell thing on this paper. I hope the forest ecosystem bounces back. Please make sure my dad doesn’t eat red meat. Also if someone could throw out the pizza under my bed that would be great._

_See ya soon,_

_Stiles._

_P.S. (FOR DEREK’S EYES ONLY) Please please please wait for me._

W

 

That first night back, Derek whiled away the early hours of the morning—every possible _second_ until daybreak—re-learning Stiles’ body. He presses his lips to the gunshot scar on Stiles’ hip, sucks a bruise into the Mongolian script inside Stiles’ knee. He chuckled at the odd angle of that one toe that never quite healed right, and Stiles kissed his smile.

 

As he stands outside the door to the loft, Stiles feels every injury he’s sustained over the last two years accutely. They throb and burn like they never have before, and his magic buzzes, not to be forgotten. Every place he’s different, every place he’s not quite _him_ anymore.

 

He can’t quite bring himself to knock, but that’s a problem easily remedied. He pulls the key out from under his shirt, unlocks the door, and steps inside. Derek looks up from the kitchen table, unsurprised. He’s probably been listening to Stiles’ heartbeat for ages while he agonized outside the door, sitting here peacefully with his morning coffee and the paper.

 

Stiles bursting through the door clearly isn’t occasion enough for Derek to stand up. Stiles shifts awkwardly from foot to foot for a minute, then blurts, “Good morning to you too, Derek, you certified _fuckwad_.”

 

Derek folds up the paper and puts it down, clearly content to let Stiles babble into an early grave. Stiles obliges. “I get where you’re coming from, alright?” he starts, in classic nonsensical fashion. “I _know_ what your problem is. And I know that now you’re icing me out, giving me the silent treatment, whatever, but it was fucking _mean_ to—to sleep with me first.”

 

There’s a little crease between Derek’s eyebrows, but he doesn’t say anything.

 

“It’s real shitty, Derek,” Stiles says, pacing just to have somewhere to put the _energy_ , “I get that it was equally sucky of me to ask you to wait, we’d only been together like _two days_ , and I’m a whole other person than I was when I left. But I don’t get why you had to _pretend_ you were glad to see me, _pretend_ you’d actually waited when really you were just mad at me the whole time for even asking—“

 

“You’re right,” Derek says, finally. He stands. Stiles watches him, brain numb, _you’re right_ playing on loop. “I was mad. I was _furious_ that you asked me to wait.” Stiles, for all that he came in here spewing false bravado, feels something inside him shatter.

 

“I’m still mad,” Derek says, moving around the table. Stiles just stands like a statue. He feels like he’s got a knife sticking out of his back, and Derek, the gorgeous beautiful bastard prowling towards him is the one who put it there. “You know I’m still mad. I’m _so fucking mad_ that you didn’t ask me to come with you.”

 

Stiles’ eyes snap to his. The whole world rearranges itself in his head.

 

“Did you _honestly_ think I wouldn’t have said yes?” Derek asks. When he doesn’t get an answer, his eyes search Stiles’ face, and he goes from frowny to _stricken_ in a second flat. “Oh, God, Stiles. You did, didn’t you? You thought I’d say _no_?”

 

Stiles makes a noise halfway between a laugh and a sob. He drags a hand over his face, crams the pieces of himself back together, and says, “Yeah.”

 

Derek shakes his head, keeps shaking his head. “You’re an idiot, Stiles,” he says, softly. “I would’ve gone with you in a _second_. No question. If you left again tomorrow, I still would.”

 

Stiles exhales all the jitters out of him, and makes very, very steady eye contact with the love of his life. “Derek,” he says, “I’ve never felt so much feeling for anyone as I do for you.”

 

A brilliant smile breaks out across Derek’s face. He gathers Stiles in his arms, Stiles’ magic gives him a gentle nudge, and their lips meet. It’s a mess—they’re both smiling, and Stiles is maybe still sort of crying a little bit, and Stiles’ sneakers are floating a couple inches off the floor, but Derek’s arms are strong around his middle, holding him down.

 

Tomorrow, the pack will complain about the smell, and Stiles will tell them to get used to it. Two days after that, Deaton will clap him on the back and say _you got the job._ And Stiles will say _what job?_ And Deaton will say _Hale pack emissary. I’m passing the torch._

 

And that night, he’ll slide into bed, and Derek will wake up and roll over and kiss him, and he’ll finally, finally say _welcome home._


End file.
